Tuesday, April 19, 2011

(THERE WERE A LOT OF IMAGES AND I DECIDED TO USE THE IMAGESHACK EMBED PLAYER TO PUT THEM UP HERE. SOMEHOW IT DIDN'T WORK. BRB.)

When I was about twelve, my friend Kayla told me her parents had bought a second house in Sommerville, Texas and a few weeks later, she invited me along. It was a small neighborhood, so her parents had bought a golf cart to travel to their neighbors if needed, and a lot of people had them, so it seemed liked a good idea.

One day, we charged it up and headed out with a sack lunch, determined to find a nice park or picnic spot. Kayla’s parent’s had gotten the golf cart for her birthday, June 21st. So we had mostly been swimming and we hadn’t seen much of the neighborhood, but now it was a crisp December weekend, we had our cardigans on and were expecting to find something interesting.

I grabbed my camera I had brought with me and we headed out. We drove into a secluded part of the neighborhood we hadn’t noticed before and were horrified at what we saw... and smelled. It smelled, to say the least, like dog shit. We covered our nose but were determined to keep going. Then we saw it, I turned on my camera and took several pictures.

We got up super close (still holding our noses) and the dogs were laying on something; we couldn’t tell what it was. Then the neighbor came out, his eyes that creepy blue like in horror movies and his face written in pain. His eyes locked on mine and he was hobbling towards us on his cane as fast as he could. Kayla screamed and sped away; all I could remember were those horrible blue eyes, burned into my skull.

As I try to remember those blue eyes I get a massive headache. But I must continue. We drove and drove for about thirty more minutes in silence until we were deep in the neighborhood. It was now getting really cloudy and I was about suggest to go home when suddenly, the golf cart broke down. The charge should have lasted about 8 more hours and the battery was fine.

It took us awhile but we finally managed to push it to the side of the road as to not abstruct passing cars. Kayla took the key and walkie-talkie that we had in case we needed help, (signal wasn’t so good out there) but it was dead too. She turned it on and off but it wouldn’t let us talk, we could only hear the other side, what her mom would have been saying.

She put the walkie talkie in her pocket and banged her head against the steering wheel, and stayed like that for a good four minutes. I sat next to her, just staring at something up ahead in the road.

“Kayla.” I said, shaking her shoulder, telling her to lift her head. She lifted her head and her orange hair whipped my face as a gust of wind hit us from behind, it was so hard I turned to see if the wind brought something else, like a piece of cardboard or maybe wood. But there was nothing behind me, so I faced Kayla again.

“What’s that?” She asked, looking straight ahead where I had. She got out of the golfcart and I followed her.

“I- I don’t know, it looks like-“ She shushed me as we were close to it. It was a broken mirror. I attatched a lot of pictures of the mirror, and I took so many because it had writing on it, I took pictures of some of the writing but here is all of what it said. (misspellings included)

By now, we were pretty freaked, but only kind of. Why would someone leave a mirror here? What we thought happened was the mirror must have fallen out of the back of the truck, but wouldn’t you here it and go back to clean up the mess? Another thing we were shoving into the back of our mind was maybe it was there on purpose. That whoever put it there meant to, or maybe they smashed it and just dumped it there.

We tested our theory with a piece of glass, we figured it didn’t just drop because when we threw the glass in the street as hard as we could; it didn’t break until hit it against the ground a few times. It also looked like this Derek fellow, or perhaps someone else, had smashed the mirror before dumping it here, as the frame and cork that held it up behind it, was hanging on by the glue, which was pretty new looking despite being dry and crumbling.

We tried to think reasonably but we kept thinking that Derek did this, and we had to find Derek. Kayla asked what we should do; I said we should clear the glass so as not to cause any cars tire’s to pop. We quickly picked up the pieces of glasses we broke and put it in the ditch next to the mirror. We headed back towards the golf cart but realized it was fucking pointless considering it was broken down and we had no way of getting home or communicating.

“Why don’t we knock on someone’s door?” I asked, but then I realized, besides the house with the dogs and the horrible stench and the man with the blue eyes, there weren’t any houses that actually looked like someone would be there. We walked up to houses that might have people in it and knocked on the door. Each time, I snapped pictures of the houses.

Kayla asked why I was taking pictures, I laughed nervously and said something about wanting to document it or look if it had anything we hadn’t noticed before. We got to this one house that was surrounded by a chicken wire fence, but we took pictures anyway, there were these two creepy masks on the fence that creeped us out and Kayla even pulled out her camera and took some pictures.

We moved onto a trailer that was obviously abandoned but at this point we were looking for anything we could use, or at least ask for directions because we were so deep in this weird part of the neighborhood we couldn’t remember the way we came. There were some cinderblocks that were stacked on top of each other so I stood on them and peered into the trailer, there were a pair of crutches and a wheel chair in a back room. After staring into the room for a long time, I felt a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach and ran to the next house.

We ran to another house that was obviously abandoned, by this time, Kayla was almost in tears, and I was trying to keep a straight face, but I wanted to cry too. This house creeped us out also, it had the door wide open, and even when a big gust of wind hit us, the door stayed perfectly open, I could hear bugs and snakes hissing and clicking, making their normal sounds, but it was amplified by the emptiness of the house. Kayla grabbed my hand as I took pictures, her grip arounds my fingers tightened and I dropped my camera.

Then we heard a voice that still makes me get chills whenever I think of what it could have been, I hear it in my head every single night, even more now since I’ve had to dig up all these pictures and remember it all. I can’t remember what it said, I just remember when Kayla heard it she burst in to tears and ran, her hand still latched onto mine, so I had no choice but to run with her. For a long time we ran, and Kayla was crying. I remembered that I dropped my Camera but Kayla wouldn’t go back, I asked her if I could atleast go,but she said she would never let any of us go back. Ever. Again.

And this is where my half of the story pretty much ends, Kayla and I ran to the golf cart, which was now working fine, and turned on the walkie talkie (which was also working fine) I looked at the time on it and realized it was 1:36 only thirty minutes after we had set out. But it had felt like hours. I tried to show Kayla the time but she refused, she said we were going to drive home and never talk about this. Kayla and I went back to the lakehouse and didn’t talk about it, as soon as we pulled into the driveway, Kayla was all smiles, saying how fun it was, and that the golf cart worked fine, and when they questioned me about where my camera was,
Kayla persisted I hadn’t brought it on this trip. We went to bed early that night, well Kayla did anyway, and with nothing else to do, I fell asleep. When I woke up the next morning my camera was in my hand, I thought maybe Kayla or her parent’s had found it or something , so I turned it on and saw the pictures I had taken, and new ones, these are the ones I found that I was SURE I hadn’t taken.

The last picture is the lake house, it was taken about the time we were eating lunch because when I woke up the next morning, Kayla’s mom had put away the chairs. I don’t remember seeing anyone out there at that time, (and I think I would have, I was staring out the window) but I do remember seeing broken glass and a tooth where in the street.

Shortly after the trip Kayla died, they said she swallowed her tongue after having a seizure. At the funeral I couldn’t bear to see her dead, it was too much for me, and I left early. I went to Kayla’s grave today, it was very nicely put together, and I was going to take a picture but my camera died as soon as I turned it on, I was able to take some pictures of the outside of the funeral home and around some smaller graves. It was a nice spring day, so despite the graves the cherry trees were in bloom and I had a feeling of optimism.

I got to Kayla’s grave and almost had a heart attack at what I saw; they were four items on the grave. One, the teddy bear from the picture that had mysteriously appeared on my camera, two, the larger mask that had been on the chicken wire fence, three, the smaller one with intricate red paintings on the eyes, and four, a note with a picture attached, “Kayla” it said, I turned it over to look at the picture, it was a picture of Kayla, in the hospital after she had died, there were red X’s over her eyes.

I dropped it in horror and burst into tears. Then I heard the voice again, this time its voice rang clear in my head, my mind. My name. The voice made me fall on the ground and pass out from shock.

Then I woke in my house, in the living room on the table it said one word “Lauren” and on the back it had a picture of me, the angle was looking down at me, my eyes were closed and I was sprawled on the ground of the cemetery, my eyes, though closed were X’d out.

Thursday, April 7, 2011

You got used to the shouts and hollers and keening. You got used to the pleading and imploring and begging. Eventually you got used to the watching, and there was but one more step to the doing. So said our Guide. This much I have to confess - Hear me now!

When the Miracle happened I was a nobody. Even then, It was beautiful. I saw...

I grip my rifle. Not a proper grip, but an embrace. Oh how cold steel reminds me and cautions me on those times of blasphemy. Yes! Even I was once obsessed with precision. And the arbitrary order of things! How many times I have recanted I cannot recall - but now the time for undoing has come. I feel it now.

Hear! I saw men and women and children awash with fear. I saw the futile trappingsand semblances give way to greater things. Harken Its tidings! I heard and I answered. I knelt and It told me to stand - I prayed and It told me to do. And I did. And all the Chosen did, and It neared. I was once a worker of cold steel but I heard and stood and did. We knew the bindings were futile and they knew, but they chose to resist. Resist It! They were the heralds, like I, but only fearfilled their heads as they viewed their success.

Now I raise this neccessary evil. It clicks and clacks and already it sags. Repent sinners! Repent and rejoice! Our brothers are many and verily the sinners will know the true meaning of salvation.

Hear! I saw the Guides, the first prophets. They were unnamed, but they didn't need names - our Guides. Heads upon heads upon heads of equines and bovines and canines piled on amalgamated forms of innumerable maws and limbs and eyes, vestigial skins of their lesser existence clinging still upon rotting legs and repurposed hands of burden adorned in entrails, blind sentience betrayed while our enemies wait with bated breath. Evangelists of futility serving...

They spoke to me. Through no mortal means, surely - I was filled with mortal fear. Fear not! We are angels and prophets. Our mission is true and we ask only for earthly brethren. The unenlightened screamed and blasphemed and they were the first for the feast. I saw the Guides deliver and lo! They grew and salvation was at hand. We are your true saviors, oh mankind.

Oh order! Far too long has this devil oppressed and crushed!

Now I squeeze and feel deteriorating mechanisms punch and work. Work no more they will foreither evil or good, as they too will be saved. As I see darkly our unsaved heathens I pray that their salvation be quick.

And now my turn has come! Lo and behold! My form crumbles! Soured and rotted is my visage as I approach It's grandeur! Molder and rot, putrify and decompose and degrade and spoil and pollute - my Guide! It devours!

IT cOmEs! it CoMEs! wE hAve truLy sErvd AnD BIrthEd ANd nOurIsHED oUr gOd. WHaT s a bTtTer ffAtte?? ITT coMeS!

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

I only got about half way through one film. The fucked up thing is it looked like it was the layout of the old appartments that were here before these were built. Granted this was only a few years back when the buildings I currently reside in were built, I could still tell the difference. There was a time stamp in the corner and everything.

Basically it started out with a person holding a camera walking into their appartment. Everything was normal for about 15 minutes or so, the person puts their keys on the counter, makes a poptart, and goes back into his one bedroom the appartment has.

I'm gunna go out on a limb and assume this person was a male based on camera angles and actions, though I could be wrong.

So basically, he goes back into the hallway that leads to the bedroom (Two doors, one sep. the living room from hallway, and second goes to actual bedroom.) He shuts the first door behind him and turns on the light. the hallway is covered with old fashion polaroids. I mean COVERED. The walls close to him are a little skimpy but the closer the hallway gets to his room they multiply and get closer together. Almost as if he built a nest of them leading to his bedroom.

He makes his way to his door and unlocks it. flicking on the light, the room looks almost as though he just moved in. average size, 14" by 10" room, queen size bed in the middle, a desk, a tv stand with just a tv on it, and that was literally it. It seemed kind of off. He placed the camera on the ground next to his bed and dug around behind the covers before lifting the sheet to reviel what he was feeling for.

At that very moment, I begged and pleaded that this was all a film project of some sort as the camera focused on a woman, probably age 23-27. Blond short pixie hair, distraught blue eyes, bound and gagged, clearly frightened and alive, but not making a sound. The entire time I watched this I had the mentality that it was all fake, just doctored to mess with someone, but then it got worse.

My skin crawled as he reached and grabbed her by the neck. he very violently yanked her out from under the bed. the camera was idle for a second or two while he rustled around and a quick cut into her lying tied up on the bed. it is now clear why she wasn't making any noise. It looked as though her throat was cut and, as it appeared to me, crudely stiched back up and healed in a very odd manor. But something even weirder caught my eye.

Her fear was seemingly no longer there. She was still breathing heavily but she seemed almost as if she was smiling. This once again put me in a stage of relief, as it looked much more fake. Perhaps someones odd sex play or something. But as I said before, it got worse.

As the camera looked at the girl on the bed, naked, tied, bound, gagged, bruised and bloodied, a knife is shown on frame. almost as iif the man is showing the knife to the camera while still having the girl in the background. I watched in horror as he walked over and pushed the kife tip into her shoulder. She squirmed her hips in the air almost as if she was getting sexual gratification out of this.

I was convinced at that point that it was fake, until he gashed open her arm with it. she bled quite a bit all over the bed, but not as much as i'd expected. after this I skipped around a bit just to see what else was in store for me.

Basically, as I skipped around, shit got real. at one point, he cut off a nipple and forced it into a stomach wound, at another point, she is missing an arm that is wrapped up and bloody of a stump, but her own hand is being used to feel around her body. All the while she is getting paler and paler, and all the time she looks like shes in more and more pleasure. At one point, her stiched up throat wound is re-opened somehow and being tickled with the severed hand. I'm talking some of the most gruesome shit I've ever seen. And I thought I'd seen it all dude.

At the end, I could barely manage to even watch anymore. I skipped to the very end and watched as he pins up a polaroid of the girls eyes, but that was all there was in the picture. Just the eyes. Just. The. Eyes. Right next to a picture of the severed arm, and an eyeless severed head. I fucking ran to my car and spent the week at my folks house. I have never EVER ran so fucking fast in my life.

If I can find my old, unimportant laptop I'll go to it tonight and megaupload something. I'll look for it when I finish my tale. Its two buildings over from mine embedded into the concrete under the staircase leading to the third floor. I wouldnt have noticed it if it hadn't been for that white out back in febuary when we got blocked in for two days.

I'll tell you what, I'll grab my camera for proof.

Imma try and break it out of the step so I can study it more. Its only about a 2 inch thick step, so how hard could it be? The only problem would be looking odd to neighbors getting it out of there.

As much as I want to share this with you and prove to you all that this fucked up shit is real, I'm not using my nice laptop to even go near that thing. I have well over 16 gb of my bands info/music/etc that I have yet to back up. I'm not risking anything happening to those files. I'll find my old windows xp laptop and be back one around this time tomorrow night for more posts.

I'll go and either get the usb drive itself out of the step, or ill put it on my old laptop and bring it with me to band practice after work. If I can't get it up on any video sites, I'll post screencaps and such. I'm a vocalist, I ain't gunna do shit else. So be back here round this time tomorrow, if not a tiny bit later.

(This is credited to a person called Nikoli Bearcrusher. A day later he admitted it was a hoax.)

It all started at my friend’s party. He’s an artist who rented out a loft in the industrial part of town. If you can picture what a place like detroit looked like in the 1920’s- that’s what this area looks like. A bunch of old turn-of-the-century factories crammed into ten blocks. Most of them are abandoned. So I partied a little too hard that night and decided to crash on a couch at the loft.

I woke up at around 4 am; the sun wasn’t out yet but you could still make things out in the dim blue light. I went to the bathroom, carefully tiptoeing around the people that were passed out on the floor. As I was taking a piss, I tiptoed to look out the bathroom window and I saw the panorama of deserted urban decay. I remembered how much I liked places like this; it was so dark and devoid of life, and strangely serene.

I went back to the couch and tried to fall asleep. After 45 minutes of staring at the ceiling, I decided I didn’t want to be there any longer. I swallowed my pride and decided to wake my girlfriend up to beg her for a ride, since walking around the vacant streets at this time was not an option. Being an awesome girlfriend, she was totally cool with it and told me she would be there in about a half-hour, and that she would give me a call when she was outside.

My phone dies ten minutes later so I decide I would sit by the window and watch for her car. I sat there for a while and my eyes started getting heavy and I began to doze off. A crashing noise outside woke me up. It wasn’t loud, but just enough to snap me into reality. I looked out the window and scanned the area but i didn’t see anybody. Across the street from the loft near a mountain of garbage bags and one of those enormous dumpsters I see a computer and a monitor smashed against the floor that hadn’t been there before.

When my girlfriend arrives I go downstairs and greet her and just as I’m about to get in the car I remembered a friend of mine had blown out his power supply so i decide to walk over to the dumpster and see what I could salvage. The monitor was worthless but the tower seemed to have suffered almost no damage so I put it in the trunk and we drove off.

About a week had passed and I had completely forgotten about the tower until one day my girlfriend calls to let me know that it was still in the trunk and that she wanted it out. That night I brought it home and before I took it apart I decided to hook it up to my monitor to see if it still ran, and to my surprise it did.

It was an xp OS and it looked like it had been wiped clean. I guess out of morbid curiosity really, I decide to do searches for words like “porn” “tits” and “pussy” in hopes of finding some secret stash full of weird deviant porn the previous owner had forgotten about. Search came up nothing. Searched for picture Files – nothing. Then I searched for movies and one file came up. It was an .avi inside a folder titled “barbie” hidden in the WINDOWS/system32 directory. So I played it...

Now this is where it gets extremely disturbing.

The movie was about an hour long of what seemed like raw exported footage. The footage was of this woman sitting on a chair and talking against a white backdrop. I skipped through most of movie and it was all the same continuous shot. Then I decided to sit though the footage to find out what she was talking about...about fifteen seconds into the footage the audio goes completely bad and her voice is drowned in harsh static/background noise.

I couldn’t make out a thing. So I import the footage into final cut and try to mess with the levels to isolate her voice, it helped a little but I still couldn’t hear what she was saying. I’m intrigued now..and I begin to really pay attention to her face and body language. It seems that shes being asked some questions because she stops at times to listen, and then continues talking. About 15 minutes into the footage, her face begins to redden and contort as if the questions are bothering her… But she continues to answer them anyways.

Shortly after she begins to cry. She sobs hysterically for the duration of the film. One of the few words I could lip read was “skin”. She repeats this word many times throughout the footage and at one point she even pulls at the skin from her arm and mouths the word. She seems to be unhappy with her skin.

It kept on building and building and about 40 minutes in she was crying so hard she could barely look at the camera. She stops talking at this point and the rest of the footage is just her crying with her head down. Oddly enough she doesn’t get up or move...then it just goes black. I was fucking stunned.

I played the whole thing through many times that night, trying to find inflections and nuances in her movement that would reveal anything else about what was going on. I felt so dissatisfied, I wanted to know more.

That’s when I noticed that there was about 10 more minutes left on the timeline after the screen went black, and about 2 minutes in there was more footage. The footage was extremely shaky, almost unwatchable, and depicted a pair of legs walking along train tracks. my guess is that camera was accidentally left on as it was being carried somewhere.

The person in this footage walks along the train tracks for about 6 minutes and then turns into the forest and walks over what looked like foliage flattened by a piece of plywood. The person continues on this makeshift plywood road until the movie clip ends.

Now my heart started beating with excitement because there where train tacks a few miles away that looked very similar to the one in the video. I HAD to check this out. I called up my friend Ezra, hes 6’4 250 pounds of mostly muscle and convinced him to go on a little adventure with me. I’m no pushover myself, but I felt if was to go wandering in the woods looking for god knows what, extra muscle couldn’t hurt. This whole idea of investigating this video had me so excited I couldn’t sleep.

The next morning on a sunny Saturday, I took my flashlight, my camera, and my 7 inch ka-bar with a matte black finish and serrated edge and went to pick up Ezra. When I got to his house he wasn’t even awake. When I woke him he pretty much told me to fuck off. I was already packed and I had mentally prepared myself to do this so I decided to go through with it without him. I parked my car at the train station, took my stuff, and hopped onto the tracks.

After walking for about two hours , I saw a broken piece of plywood and my knees almost buckled with excitement. I searched the nearby foliage, and there it was, a little plywood trail leading into the forest. I walked slowly along the trail, paying close attention to everything. I would stop occasionally, kneel down, and listen for anything or anyone...but it was so quiet. This was one of the most nerve racking things ive ever done. I didnt know what to expect at the end of this trail.

The dense tree line gave way into a little island of grassy field, and then I saw it; it was a house that looked like it was being consumed by the forest. From the looks of it no one had lived there for 20 maybe 30 years. I got my camera and snapped a few pics. A few yards away from the house was a tool shed made of rusty sheet metal. I just sat there among the trees for a while, absorbing everything. I didn’t want to go into the open field, I had this bad feeling that something would see me.

It took me a while to muster the courage to up to the house. the door was partly opened, I pushed it in with the flashlight and was relieved that the inside was actually very well lit. I put my flashlight away, got my camera and took a few more pics. There was no furniture, the floor was riddled with bricks and wood and rubble, and some of the walls had huge holes in them. When I went in further to explore, I saw some things that I didn’t pay much mind to in that moment, but now that I think about them in hindsight, greatly disturb me.

The first thing that seemed a little odd, was that one of the doors in the first room, that I presumed led to the basement, seemed a little too new to be in this house, and that it was also the only door in the house that was locked. Also, when I made my way up to the second floor, I saw some chairs and a fold-up table that also seemed a little too new to be there. But what disturbed me the most for some reason, was the bathroom.

The dust on the mirror had been wiped away, and in the bathtub, I saw a clear plastic tarp that still had water droplets on it from, when I presume, it was washed cleaned. That’s when I heard something moan really loud and that’s when I jump the fuck out of the second story window and ran back to the tracks.

Halfway there I realized the moaning was most likely a water pipe expanding or contracting, and that little moment of relief gave into the horror that I felt when I wondered why the water would be running on an abandoned house in the middle of the fucking woods. Its been a little more than 2 months since this happened and I haven’t gone back there, nor plan to.

(Don't feel like grammar/spelling editing such a long story. Also, the uploader of the videos says that after uploading parts 1, 2, and 4, the OP of the original thread disappeared and never uploaded the other 3 parts.)

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

The following text is copied from a journal I found hidden behind a loose piece of trim in my dorm room. Accompanying the journal was only a slightly rusted penny with an odd symbol carved into it. Some pages of the book are damaged. It appears that the book was wet at some point. I’ll try to fill in the blanks as best as I can. My comments will appear in brackets.

July 31, 1994

Got this new journal from Mom in the mail today. It’s pretty nice. It has leather binding and the dates written in for me and everything. Well, I guess I should write about my day. That’s the point I imagine. I saw Jim again today. I wish I knew more people like him. I’m starting to hate this place. Most of these kids are rich as hell. Snobs. I’m just good at swimming. Who the hell gets a swimming scholarship anyways? I found out Jim goes to that school just down the road. Can’t remember the name right now. I’ve had this crazy headache all day. At least that school is close enough to walk to. I’ll be able to hang out with Jim more often. He’s a really cool guy. [Random scribble] It’s so hard to write right now. My roommate is playing that obnoxious music. Who really needs to practice their trumpet at 12:30? He’s so inconsiderate. [Water damage over a word that appears to be “whatever”]

August 1, 1994

The classes are really tough. I don’t understand any of the math junk Professor Lo was talking about. At least we didn’t get any homework today. I don’t know what to do with my time though. The pools still aren’t ready yet, and I don’t really know too many other things to do after class on a Monday. To make things worse, John [the roommate?] has been spazzing out that I need to keep quiet so he can take his nap. Are you kidding me? If he doesn’t shape up soon, me and him are going to have some problems. [Bottom of the page is messed up, but doesn’t seem to have had any words on it anyways. If more pages have damage that doesn’t seem to hide any text, I won’t bother to mention it again.]

August 2, 1994

Worst day yet. My Tuesday Thursday schedule is even tougher than my Monday Wednesday Friday schedule. No homework today either though. I guess that’s a good thing, but I had this crazy headache today. I wish I had some medicine to make me feel better. Maybe I should head to the clinic? [There’s water damage over the next few lines. I honestly can’t make it out.] posed to meat Jim at Lafortune today, but he wasn’t there. I don’t think he would bail on me. I’ll call him tomorrow.

August 3, 1994

I called Jim today. He was acting really strange. He said he wasn’t sure if he should tell me. He said he didn’t want to get me involved. I tried to make him tell me what was the matter, but after a little while, he said he had to go and hung up. I’m really worried. If he isn’t better by the end of the week, I think I should call the cops.

August 4, 1994

Well, today was a big improvement. My headache cleared up, Jim called and said he had his problem under control, and even John seemed a bit nicer. I even got to swim for the first time since I got here. Being in the water makes me feel so much better. It’s such a good way to burn off stress. My classes were tough, but I got the work done. I’m really looking forward to tomorrow. Jim mentioned some kind of party.

August 5, 1994

Met with Jim today. We had a lot of fun. We went swimming, got some pizza, and went to a party over at his dorm. I met a pretty cute girl there, but it turned out she already had a boyfriend. He wasn’t too happy, but I don’t care. We didn’t fight or anything like that, so it doesn’t really matter. I had a good time. I barely made it back before curfew. I had to run pretty fast. [A big smudge here, words are completely gone] one pretty weird thing though. He dropped some change and really freaked out. I asked him about it and he said [smudge interrupts a good bit of this line too] mattered to him.

August 6, 1994

First weekend on campus. The first football game isn’t until next weekend, so we had practice today. I don’t mind. I enjoyed myself. Some of the guys on the team are pretty out of shape for people who want to be swimmers. It was funny watching them breathing so hard after just a few laps. Later, John asked about yesterday. I told him about the party and he seemed interested. He asked if he could meet Jim some time. I’m glad he’s not being such a jerk for once. Maybe if I invite him along the next time me and Jim hang out, he’ll start acting nicer more often.

August 7, 1994

Today was really weird. I don’t know what’s going on. My headache randomly came back in swim practice. I blacked out. The coach was really worried when I woke up. He sent me to the clinic and they said I’m fine. The doctor checked everything he could think of and it all came up normal. On the bright side, they gave me some medicine for in [Another damaged area. I can only make out the word headache.] weird thing was, I remember seeing this really [smudge interrupts this line too, part of it seems like the word “guy”] -fore I blacked out.

August 8, 1994

Wow. Mondays are awful. The whole day was a blur. I was really tired all day and worse yet, I forgot the pills in my dorm room. The headache came back in full force and I didn’t even have them with me for a few hours. Going to bed. [This page is substantially damaged, but since the entry was so shout, none of it was interrupted.]

August 9, 1994

Classes went alright today. I’m finally starting to get a little bit of the chemistry. I’ll take what I can get in that class. I saw [Huge water damage, the rest of the page is completely illegible. It appears that this page happened to be open when the book got wet.]

August 10, 1994

Well, I got to see Jim again. It was okay. At first everything was normal. We were just relaxing in the common room. I even invited John to come chill with us, and he did. It was pretty messed up though. After a few minutes, John just randomly got up and left and then Jim freaked out. His wallet was missing. I know John took it, but when I was heading over to get it back (and maybe kick

[There’s a good bit of damage, but the entry is rather long and text continues afterwards.]

RAs had to get involved. I know he took it. I can’t believe they made me switch rooms with Carl. I’m going to get back at John for sure.

August 11, 1994

Jim called me. He was really freaking out. He just kept saying how he lost the thing. It was the only thing because the symbol doesn’t work on others. I don’t get what he means at all. I tried to get him to calm down, but he hung up on me. I called the cops and they said they sent over a squad car, but I don’t know what happened. I’m really worried about [This page is pretty bad too, but thankfully most of the entry is intact. The damage appears to diminish as the pages progress after this]

August 12, 1994

Jim died. They found him facedown floating in the pool with some weird slash on his chest. I don’t know what I’m going to do. He was my only friend here. I should beat [there’s some damage here] but I never see him around anymore. I’m going to his funeral tomorrow. The coach will have to get over it.

August 13, 1994

Jim’s funeral was really sad. I talked to his Mom. She had no idea that anything was wrong. I feel terrible. I should’ve done something. I don’t know. I’m really stressed. I want to go swim for a while, but the headache came back at the funeral and hasn’t gone away since. Those pills didn’t do anything. I saw that weird guy again. He was just [Spot of water damage] from a distance. I don’t know what to think about him. He must be wearing some sort of [Spot interrupts this line too.] Maybe he works for the school or something. Whatever, I think I’m going to swim anyways.

August 14, 1994

I’m starting to get pretty suspicious of that guy. I think he’s following me. I saw him yesterday after I got done swimming. What’s with the plain white mask? That’s really out there. Maybe I’m just paranoid, but I’m going to call the cops if he doesn’t back off. Either way, I have other problems. I’ve got to do something about John. I know he stole Jim’s wallet and I know that stressed Jim out and had something to do with his death. I’m going to get the wallet back and I’m going to get John back for [the last bit is illegible]

August 15, 1994

Success. I got the wallet. That moron. He left his room unlocked when he went to class today. I found it in his room, just sitting in a drawer of his desk. I don’t know if I should turn it in though. If I do, I get John in huge trouble for stealing, but I get in trouble too. Either way, I’m going to beat him senseless next time we’re alone.

August 16, 1994

Well, I don’t know exactly what to say. John transferred. He’s in California now. That rich prick can switch schools on a whim. I think he knew I was after him. Whatever. I don’t know what to do now. I mean, I guess at the very least I got the wallet away from him. All that’s in it is Jim’s ID, a few bucks, a speedway card, and some change. John was rich though. I don’t get why he [a bit of a smudge here, but it looks like it says “vaulo steel”. I’m not exactly sure.] I really miss Jim. He would know what was going on.

August 17, 1994

Well, today was uneventful. Classes are starting to feel normal. Dining hall food is starting to get old. I still miss Jim. Not much to report. My headaches have cleared up though. I guess that’s good.

August 18, 1994

Carl gave me a note today. He said it was from John. All it was was a crumpled up piece of paper with a weird drawing of a tall stick figure guy. Then on the back it said “thepenny”. I checked Jim’s wallet and noticed that there IS one weird penny. It has this crazy mark on it. I don’t know what it means though. Carl had no clue. I tried to call John, but I don’t have his number and the number Carl gave me is dead. I’m rather confused.

August 19, 1994

I’m really freaking out. I was at practice today and I saw that really tall guy again. All of a sudden my headache hit me like a truck. I asked Sam what he thought about the guy, but he didn’t see him. So I asked Nick, but he didn’t see him either. After practice I asked the coach and he just looked at me like I was crazy. He told me to sit down and then had this big talk. Either way, I’m his best swimmer, so he won’t do anything, but he’s worried about me. I don’t know what I should do.

August 20, 1994

The guy is everywhere. Everywhere I go, he’s just looking at me. It’s the creepiest feeling ever. I called the cops, but they didn’t believe me. They said I was just stressed because of Jim. I noticed too, every time the guy shows up, my headache comes back. Maybe it is all in my head. I don’t know what to do. At least he never comes to my dorm. I don’t know why.

August 21, 1994

I keep seeing him. I’m really freaking out. Nobody else ever notices him. Maybe this is what happened to Jim. I can’t even think straight. I’m so tired. The guy is everywhere. I got a better look at him today. It isn’t a mask. His face…. It just isn’t there. I called my Mom, but I couldn’t tell her. She’s so proud that I’m here. I can’t tell her that I’m scared and want to leave. What if it IS just my imagination? A guy with no face watching me? That doesn’t even make any sense. Then again, if he isn’t real why does my headache only come back when he’s around?

August 22, 1994

I get it. The penny keeps the guy away. I don’t know why, but he didn’t come near me at all today and I had Jim’s wallet with me. Including the penny. I’m more scared than ever now though. When Jim didn’t have it, he got killed. I have to keep this with me at all times. On the plus side, as long as I always have the penny, I should be okay.

August 23, 1994

I was right. I had the penny with me all day and I never saw him once. I didn’t get any headaches either. The problem is swimming. If I take the penny in the pool, I might lose it, but if I don’t I won’t have it with me. I can’t not swim or I’ll get thrown out. I’m not sure what to do, but I have practice tomorrow.

August 24, 1994

I left the penny right on the side of the pool. It was with my towel. There was no way I misplaced it. I’m so scared. Someone had to have taken it. Well, at least I haven’t seen the guy yet. Maybe he still thinks I have it. I can pretend to still have it. I hope it works. I’ll search for it tomorrow.

August 25, 1994

He watched me search for it. He literally followed me and watched me searching the whole time. It was nowhere in the whole Rec Center though. I looked everywhere. I’m freaking out. My headache is back. It’s so bad. I even saw him outside my window earlier. That’s the closest to my dorm he’s ever come. My own room isn’t even safe. I’m going to start keeping my journal with me at all times so I can write whatever happens. This is the only way I can confide. I can’t tell anyone. Nobody will believe me.

August 26, 1994

He was in my room last night. I woke up and there was a note. ISEEYOUSLEEPING That was all it said. On the back was the same symbol as the one on the penny. He knows I need it. I don’t think that he has it though. He never comes near it. I don’t know where else to look.

August 27, 1994

I got it. I got it back. I still can’t believe it. Me and Sam went for pizza after practice and it was just sitting there in that lame little take a penny – leave a penny thing. I snatched it up so fast. Sam looked at me like I was crazy, but I don’t care. I’m safe now. It’s such a relief. I feel so much better.

August 28, 1994

Wow, today was pretty sweet. I feel so much better. I got all my work done, I called my Mom and talked to her for a bit. I think I’ll take my journal and my penny and go for a swim right now as a matter of fact.

[I checked the records. A student was found dead in the pool in the Rec Center the very next morning. It was speculated that he had went for a late night swim and had drowned. His blood tests came up negative for any alcohol, but there was no evidence of any foul play and the death was considered an accident. I personally find it odd that Notre Dame’s top swimmer just happened to drown that night. I think I had better hang onto this penny. Just in case.]